


so let it out and let it in

by nowhere_blake



Series: codas for the damned and the brokenhearted [6]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Dean Winchester is Protective of Sam Winchester, Dean Winchester is Sam Winchester's Parent, Episode: s12e02 Mamma Mia, Established Relationship, Gen, Guilt, Hurt Sam Winchester, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Implied/Referenced Incest, M/M, Mary Winchester struggles with motherhood, Mary's first glance at her sons' relationship, POV Outsider, Podfic Available, Protective Dean Winchester, Quote: "Bitch." "Jerk." (Supernatural), also Sam is very tall, established incest is implied but this is hard gen really, they are unsettlingly close but what else is new
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-08
Updated: 2020-10-08
Packaged: 2021-03-08 00:07:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,459
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26896432
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nowhere_blake/pseuds/nowhere_blake
Summary: Mary has no clue how to be a mother to two grown men she's just met. God, she can barely hug them right, her little boys: she used to be able to just pick them up without any difficulty and now they engulf her in a simple embrace, wide shoulders and muscly arms, smelling all manly and not of baby powder like they are supposed to.Coda to 12x02 Mamma Mia.
Relationships: Dean Winchester & Sam Winchester, Dean Winchester/Sam Winchester
Series: codas for the damned and the brokenhearted [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1883758
Comments: 28
Kudos: 453





	so let it out and let it in

**Author's Note:**

> title from _Hey Jude_ by the Beatles - say what you will about Mary, but her lullaby choices are excellent

Sam is tall. Her Sammy, her little baby boy… He’s tall.

She thought Dean was tall, she had to stretch herself up the first time she hugged him, a body of a man, of a stranger, her _son._ But Sam. He is _tall_. Even beaten up and in pain, chained to a chair, all bloody and hunched over… He is large. Wide shoulders, long legs, the whole thing. A whole entire man. A big one at that. Her baby. Her Sammy, who apparently had a chance to get out of the life, but chose his brother instead.

She has more pressing issues on her hands, but for a split second she gets distracted. She has a hard time reconciling this large, grown-up man in front of her and the baby that was inside of her once. She still remembers what it felt like when he first started kicking, can feel the phantom pain of it, of Dean’s little hand on her tummy, fascinated but mortified, shrieking with joy, but pulling away every time he felt the movement beneath her skin.

‘That’s Sammy?’ he kept asking, like he couldn’t believe it. After Sam was born, she sometimes caught him staring at Sam's little feet, pressing his clumsy fingers to the soles of them with such intent and concentration, like he was hoping Sam would recognize his touch from the inside.

Now though, Mary’s little boy is bleeding and broken, his huge feet - he had such tiny toes as a baby, but now he is a man, probably wearing size 12 shoes, and even the thought makes Mary’s head spin - roughly bandaged up against the dirty, damp floor.

Fighting is easier, it's in her body, it comes naturally. She barely even knows what Sam looks like as an adult, but she wants to kill anyone who'd ever hurt him. Punching and kicking is simple and instinctive, it makes more sense to her than anything so far in this strange future world. It's unsettling, considering she's been running from it her whole life, but at least she's good at it. She would never admit it, even to herself, but being a hunter is etched deeper into her body and soul than anything else, even being a mother.

Once the fighting is all over, Mary watches Dean get his brother outside, watches the lingering touches as he checks for the worst of Sam’s injuries, the same intent look, the same concentration when he was only four years old. These are her boys? She barely recognizes them, but there is something familiar about Dean taking care of Sammy, staring at him with all that devotion on his face, making him look younger than the lines around his eyes would let you believe.

Mary feels like crying. Or throwing up actually. It’s overwhelming. It’s so fucked up.

She has no clue how to be a mother to two grown men she's just met. God, she can barely hug them right, her little boys: she used to be able to just pick them up without any difficulty and now they engulf her in a simple embrace, wide shoulders and muscly arms, smelling all manly and not of baby powder like they are supposed to. She hates it.

On the drive back, she watches them, dazed, but fascinated by everything they’ve become. It's hard to look at them and see them for who they are; _her children_ , difficult to see the consequences of her own actions, but she can’t look away. Sam still seems pretty out of it, even with the angel, Castiel, having healed most of his injuries. He looks so big in the back seat, even slumped over, eyes glassy, as he is, completely deflated the moment the Brits were out of sight. Mary’s little boy.

She watches as Dean hovers over him, makes sure he’s out of his wet and dirty clothes, bundled into a blanket thoroughly. Watches Dean mother him, do Mary’s job for her, like it was second nature to him. She hates herself fiercely just then.

There is a moment before they get on the road that stays with Mary, gets stuck in her mind, plays on a loop, like a broken record. Sam sitting on top of the hood of the car, with his feet dangling, like a little boy, and Dean between his legs, apparently checking for a concussion. Hands Mary has seen throwing punches, handle guns, now surprisingly careful, _gentle_. There’s a soft murmur - they are talking to each other - and Mary’s not standing far from them at all, but she can’t make out any of it. They seem lost to everything around them, but each other, and Mary shifts her weight awkwardly from one foot to another. Dean has the keys, so she can’t even get inside the car.

Her eyes find Castiel, standing against his truck, looking a little bored, like he’s seen this all before. There is something on his face that Mary recognizes as habit, something that means he is used to waiting Sam and Dean out, that he’s learnt not to interrupt.

She looks back at her boys then and shivers. They are so close to each other now that Dean’s lips almost touch Sam’s ear. Their body language is so much of a parent and a child, but also just… strangely intimate, here, out in the open, even if there’s no one else around them, and she feels it's almost indecent. She has to look away, as if she were intruding on something private. As she’s awkwardly staring out into the distance, she’s suddenly reminded of what Dean told her earlier, about how Sam got back into hunting after getting out.

‘When Dad disappeared… Sam and I looked around, and something became very clear. That the only thing we had in this world, the _only_ thing - aside from this car - was each other.’

Some things slot into place when she first sees them together like that, just existing in each other's space, interacting. It makes more sense now. How much of what Dean told her about the future, sitting on that bench, was just praise about Sam. The look on Dean's face when he saw the blood on the bunker floor, how he reached for his gun, calling Sammy's name, leaving her to fend for herself without hesitation. The threats he spat at that Bevell woman over the phone, the sharp snap when he broke it in half after she hung up on him. The pride on his face when he told her about Stanford, about how hunting is what they do, who they are.

She’s broken out of her reverie by Dean pulling the car over at a truck stop an hour later. She looks around, confused. They had a toilet break and a food run not so long ago, and the drive is not that long back to Kansas.

‘Mom…’ he says, and it still sounds strange - Dean is not used to saying it, Mary’s not used to the deep of his voice. They both freeze for a second, but power through. ‘Can you drive?’ Dean asks her quietly and she nods, although not understanding why. ‘He doesn’t… Sam’s not eating,’ Dean explains, a quick glance at his brother in the rearview mirror.

She looks back at Sam too, where he’s slumped against the window with his eyes closed.

‘You wanna wake him up?’ she asks, strangely feeling like she doesn’t have the right to question, like Sam is Dean’s responsibility and not her own.

‘Oh, he’s not asleep,’ Dean says with a soft almost-smile, maybe a little embarrassed at knowing better than her. ‘Probably reciting Civil Procedures in his head. It helps ground him. Easier with eyes closed,’ he shrugs, like he’s saying, _you know what he’s like, that’s just Sam_ , but Mary doesn’t, of course. How would she?

She stares back at him, but when Dean looks away sheepishly, Mary thinks it’s not because he caught himself, but because he thinks he’s revealed too much, given away Sam’s secrets.

Mary wonders how he knew Sam wasn’t asleep in the first place. His breathing? His posture? She can’t tell. But Dean has watched him fall asleep enough times to know. Her heart aches, envies and hates Dean for it all at the same time.

By the time Mary slides over to the driver’s seat Dean is already climbing in next to Sam, and now that she’s looking for it, Mary can see it, Sammy’s mouth moving silently, like he’s mumbling something. What did Dean say? Civil Procedures?

Dean doesn’t touch him at first, lets him mutter away a little longer. Mary wonders why he doesn’t try and snap him out of it. She pulls out of the truck stop, the rumbling of the car familiar under her touch - reassuring and unchanged like nothing else so far.

Finally Sam opens his eyes, and sure enough, he doesn’t blink all confused, like he’s been asleep. He just opens them. Looks at the driver’s seat, frowns a little when he sees her, probably expecting Dean.

‘Hey, lawyer boy,’ Dean murmurs, pitching his voice low, as if afraid he might startle him.

Sam lets out a breath audibly, his body losing tension immediately as he looks at his brother.

‘Dean.’ His voice is hoarse and shivery from the screaming, from the cold water, from the drugs. Mary's knuckles go white on the steering wheel.

‘Yeah, right ‘ere, Sammy,’ Dean says, not taking his eyes off his little brother. It makes Mary uncomfortable how Dean - who's been so easily tactile with her - is not touching Sam at all now, not even trying to comfort him.

‘For real?’ Sam asks, sounding so heartbreakingly young, like a frightened child. He's shaking a little.

‘For real,’ Dean repeats, not breaking eye-contact, but still not moving, staying as still as the car’s swaying allows, and Mary suddenly realizes she’s holding her breath as she watches them in the mirror.

When Sam reaches out - a clumsy, uncoordinated movement - Dean moves toward him, like he was expecting it. It dawns on Mary then that there was a reason Dean wouldn’t touch him before, was waiting for Sam to make the first move, _be okay_ with touch, want it himself. She feels bile rising in her throat as she wonders what pre-empted that, what Sam must have gone through in the past that meant Dean knew to do that.

Sam lets his palm drop onto Dean’s thigh, open, like an invite. And it’s like Dean was waiting for it, his fingers are already there, his thumb digging into Sam’s palm in a way that must be painful, _is_ painful by the sound of the hiss Sam lets out. Dean doesn’t stop though. He doesn’t look away from Sam either, just squeezes Sam’s palm, digs his nails in until Mary’s sure he’s gonna draw blood.

‘Okay,’ Sam gasps then, and the moment he does, Dean takes away his hand, smooths over the mark he left on Sam’s skin with careful fingertips.

‘Okay?’ Dean asks, still caressing Sam’s palm absent-mindedly.

‘Yeah. Okay. All real,’ Sam concludes, like it’s taking all his energy to do so, but it seems important for him to say it out loud. He collapses a little more then, still gasping from the pain in his palm, and Mary doesn’t know what this was, what kind of ritual between her two boys, hates it, wants it to never have happened.

The next time she looks over, Sam is pushing himself off the window towards Dean, knocks into him, like he can’t stop himself. Dean is braced for the impact though, barely sways under all the dead weight of his _tall tall tall,_ huge man of a little brother. Sam burrows his face into Dean’s shoulder, folds himself into his side, and for the first time Mary can finally see it. Yes. Dean’s little brother. Her little Sammy.

‘You have to eat something,’ Dean says, carding through Sam’s long hair, combing out the knots carefully, wincing a little when his fingers catch on a clump of blood or dirt, even though Sam doesn’t stir.

‘Sammy,’ Dean says then, more insistent now, his fingers finding the side of Sam’s face, tracing his cheekbone. ‘You have to eat. I’m serious.’

‘Okay, De’,’ Sam mumbles, blinking tiredly now, his body more relaxed with each breath, all the tension draining out of him. ‘What do ya got?’ Sam questions without opening his eyes.

‘They didn’t have smoothies, so got you a juice. Get some sugar in you. It says it’s from concentrate, you can bitch at me about that later. Vegetable soup, it’s still hot. The girl at the Gas-N-Sip said it’s actually pretty edible. She had a tattoo that said “Gary forever” though, so not sure if she’s to be trusted. Got a chicken salad as well if you feel up to something more solid later. Probably not just now - ease you into it. Otherwise your stomach will hurt like a son of a bitch later.’

Mary listens to the low rumble of Dean’s voice, more words than he’s said the entire day, and she thinks she knows why he’s talking so much, can see Sam relaxing as the sound washes over him, like it’s a special lullaby.

‘What did Gary ever do to you?’ Sam mutters, and there is a shadow of a smirk pulling at the corner of his mouth, his eyes still closed, face still half-buried into Dean’s shoulder. ‘Maybe he _is_ forever,’ he says, which doesn’t even make sense, but Dean lets out a chuckle anyway.

‘Just drink your juice,’ Dean says gruffly, then there is a pause - just long enough to mark the significance: ‘Bitch.’

Mary glances over sharply, has the urge to tell Dean off for using a bad word, but Sam’s smiling. Honest to god smiling.

‘I will if you stop fussing,’ he replies. And then: ‘Jerk.’

It sounds more like a term of endearment than an insult, it sounds like when she calls John honey, when John calls her sweetheart. It takes her breath away. She's mesmerized by the way they are together, by what her children have grown into, but she equally loathes it all. She feels so guilty, so angry. She blames herself for missing it all, but curses the universe for letting them grow up while she wasn't there, has the irrational thought that they should have stayed small until she could be there to take care of them.

‘I don’t fuss,’ Dean says, affronted, but his hand is hovering over the juice bottle at Sam’s lips, just in case he drops it. Mary would laugh, if her heart weren't in her throat. Okay. That's Sam and Dean then. These are her boys.

**Author's Note:**

> I shall be freaking out about the new episode tonight, say hi on tumblr if you will be too [ @princessconsuelapark](https://princessconsuelapark.tumblr.com/) 💕
> 
> buy me a [coffee](https://www.buymeacoffee.com/nowhereblake) if you feel like ☕

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] so let it out and let it in | By nowhere_blake](https://archiveofourown.org/works/29382963) by [ladygizarme](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladygizarme/pseuds/ladygizarme)




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